Are libraries obsolete? : an argument for relevance in the digital age

267 Pages·2014·1.73 MB·English

by  Herring

Are Libraries
Obsolete?
ALSO BY MARK Y. HERRING
Fool’s Gold: Why the Internet Is No
Substitute for a Library(McFarland, 2007)
Are Libraries
Obsolete?
An Argument for Relevance
in the Digital Age
M Y. H
ARK ERRING
McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
Jefferson, North Carolina
Nihil obstat quominus imprimatur
ISBN 978-0-7864-7356-4
♾
softcover : acid free paper
LIBRARYOFCONGRESSCATALOGUINGDATAAREAVAILABLE
BRITISHLIBRARYCATALOGUINGDATAAREAVAILABLE
© 2014 Mark Y. Herring. All rights reserved
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form
or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying
or recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the publisher.
Cover images © Fuse/iStock/Thinkstock
Manufactured in the United States of America
McFarland & Company, Inc., Publishers
Box 611, Jefferson, North Carolina 28640
www.mcfarlandpub.com
For Carol
Quos amor verus tenuit, tenebit.—Seneca
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Table of Contents
Preface and Acknowledgments 1
Part One 5
1. Introduction 7
2. Everything Is Still Not on the Internet 19
3. Searching the Web 30
4. Quality Control, or Lack Thereof 42
5. Rotting from Within? 57
6. En Masse: Mass Digitization 67
7. Copyright 80
8. Ebooks Über Alles? 96
9. Depth and Ubiquity 111
Part Two 123
10. Reading and Literacy 126
11. Privacy 138
12. Piracy 150
Part Three 165
13. You Are Here 171
14. Are Libraries Obsolete After All? Two Scenarios 187
vii
viii Table of Contents
Epilogue: Reviving the Spirit of Andrew Carnegie 216
Chapter Notes 219
Selected Bibliography 246
Index 255
Preface and Acknowledgments
The changes that have occurred in librarianship over the last decade and
a half are more than all the combined changes that have occurred since Dewey.
No, I’m not over one hundred years old, but I became a librarian in 1978, so
I think I can say with some assurance that the changes I have witnessed over
the last fourteen or fifteen years are far more remarkable and long lasting
than those theretofore. The question that is on everyone’s mind—and it really
is on the minds of many librarians though they are reluctant to admit it—is,
Are libraries obsolete? That is what this book is about.
I won’t answer that question here (I give a strong hint in the Introduc-
tion) but let me say what the book is not. This is not a screed against the
Internet, though to raise even an air of criticism about the World Wide Web
makes some web aficionados hyperventilate. On the other hand, even to hint
to some librarians that libraries may possibly be, one day, in some sort of
decline that may end in a tailspin that may make them, well, not as robust as
they are now—you can see by the convoluted construction how much I’m
hedging to avoid their wrath—is to commit the highest form of heresy. My
prayer is that I have not offended either side so much that they both hate the
work here.
I am not anti- anything in this book, especially when it comes to the
web. Look what happened to the much- beloved Jonathan Franzen, now the
much hated, after his “What’s Wrong with the Modern World” appeared in
September 13, 2013, issue of the Guardian. The “wrong” is all our device-
mania, and twitterverse blew up in his face for that, calling him a curmudg-
eon, one of the nicer comments. In order to make the case, however, one has
to draw a line in the sand. As Flannery O’Connor once said in another context
entirely, you sometimes have to write in all capitals before people will notice.
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